Idioms

brown-noser

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brown-noser

One who seeks out the approval, attention, or support of others, especially superiors, through abject subservience, flattery, or fawning. Tim is such an obvious brown-noser, always complementing the boss on her ideas and saying yes to anything she suggests. If you keep being such a brown-nose in class, the other kids are going to start bullying you. John is such a brown-noser, falling all over himself to impress the teacher.
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2024 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

brown-noser

verb
McGraw-Hill's Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions Copyright © 2006 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
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References in periodicals archive
Most likely to cause offence are the 'brown-nosers' who suck up to the boss, just one of 11 categories identified by the poll.
more ocean-going royal toadying from BBC brown-noser Andrew Marr.
Nice guy, but a brown-noser. Whinges about how uncool it is to be on BB.
He broke a stunned silence, turning to the brown-noser, raising his glass and saying: "And you are an effing creep."
Brown-noser Luke has been busy making sure he's everyone's best friend.
'Vote Labour, vote Brown', boasts Brown-noser Nick.
Brown-noser Grogan hedged his bets at Prime Minister's Question Time by praising both the PM and the Chancellor.
He's the brown-noser who delivered Quality Street chocolates to a tyrant in possession of a genocide programme Hitler himself would have envied.
After all, as one brown-noser pointed out, "Wills was a country lad.
Why a paper with a working-class readership employs an upper- class brown-noser like you is beyond me.
Meanwhile, three bonus points to Alan Hansen for exposing Jimmy Hill as the brown-noser we all suspected he was.
As he took strongest exception to the mistaken belief that Mirrorman Reade had branded him a Mandelson-style "brown-noser", his mum was gradually calming down.
Aquarian bosses prefer employees who aren't moody, and finally Scorpio bosses can spot a brown-noser a mile away.
Energetic employees can expect others to accuse them of being "brown-nosers." You hand self-starters a self-help book, they often see themselves being written about, with many complaining, "Damn, I could have written that."
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